Serna: Will the Kris-Ruffa incident raise TV ratings?

MORE often than not, I’m out of the house on Sunday afternoons, either riding a bus on the way back to the city from my hometown or just anywhere else enjoying the last hours of the weekend break.

Last Sunday was different as I was comfortably seated in my boarding house while watching TV and doing some minor chores [during commercial breaks].

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It came as a surprise to me when show biz news headlined the Ruffa Gutierrez “walk out” from The Buzz because of something that Kris Aquino said or did. Which one?

Where was I when it happened?

Based on the printed reports detailing the scenes before the walkout, I can conclude that a dzMM show biz commentator’s description of the incident “as a gimmick” holds some truth. It makes people interested in Ruffa’s new show in a different television channel.

Although I can be hardly called a Kris Aquino fan, this time I admire the actress for issuing a public apology to Ruffa and the Gutierrez family. The question is: Was the apology necessary?

Now I’m looking forward to see whether the incident will help (ratings and viewership-wise) Ruffa’s coming talk show with Cristy Fermin and Mo Twister, which will clash with the time slot of The Buzz.

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I’m glad that popular tri-media personality Leo Lastimosa has taken up in his newspaper column some pointers regarding the Visayan language particularly on the use of some words, like ug, og, kay, kini and others.

I remember writing about an accusation from somebody who described himself as a lover of the Visayan language.

He accused new and young broadcasters (mostly not from Cebu) for corrupting the Visayan (or Cebuano for that matter) language.

It’s not just a dialect anymore, as another Visayan language lover stressed. I hope something productive and beneficial to the language will come out from this development. Can the academe or other cultural sectors extend help in this issue?

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After having been absent from the scene for quite some time, the search for Mr. Mandaue City bounces back to life. A new organization has exerted effort to make the search a big part of the city’s fiesta activities in May. The group is headed by Nanette Cortes Bowler with Clarence Sanchez as co-chairman, and award-winning choreographer Jojin Pascual as executive director.

The city has long been conducting beauty searches and coronations for girls and boys, young ladies and matrons but not one has been focusing on the city’s gorgeous, young gentleman.

There was a time when an attempt was made, but it was only good for one outing and nothing was heard of it again. Now this.

Tomorrow, the final selection of the 15 finalists will be held at the plaza fronting the Mandaue City Hall and on Monday, March 15, these guys will be formally presented to the public in a press conference at the Park Mall. Good luck, gentlemen!

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I was so amused at last Sunday’s episode of Going Bulilit. The theme was the El Niño phenomenon. In one scene, I had a hard time pointing out where I saw the two actors (male and female) whose faces looked quite familiar. The boy lamented on the lack of water and his failure to take a shower.

He then asked the girl if she was able to take a shower or a bath and if she had, where. The girl (in a peculiar pose) answered in the affirmative and added: “Sa dagat ng basura (In the sea of garbage).”

That did it. The two were among the child actors in a presidential candidate’s campaign commercial.

***

Another pair played the role as farmers. The boy lamented over the fact that their plants have died, and the possibility of going hungry and penniless. The girl cried in reaction. The boy asked if the girl was really crying because he did not actually see tears rolling down her cheeks.

Feigning surprise, the girl exclaimed that the El Niño was indeed so severe even her tear glands had dried up (or words to that effect).

Kudos to the show’s writers and to the young actors for a good job. It made my day.